Locked Away
by Jetsjb13
Summary: She wakes up alone in a pitch dark room. She's scrambling, trying to find her way, desperately screaming at the top of her lungs for help. But it is useless, she sighs as she realizes that she's stuck and abandoned. Suddenly, a door on the other side of the room opens, the bright light burning her eyes. No Elder Scroll characters but Skyrim setting and magic.
1. Chapter 1

She wakes up alone in a pitch dark room. She's scrambling, trying to find her way, desperately screaming at the top of her lungs for help. But it is useless, she sighs as she realizes that she's stuck and abandoned. Suddenly, a door on the other side of the room opens, the bright light burning her eyes.

"Welcome Tori," said the mysterious man "from this moment on you are my personal slave...assistant if that title suits you better" He cackles as he continues to stand near the door. From the light shining through she can somewhat make out his pale and hardened face. Despite looking almost ill, he appeared to be seventeen or eighteen, the same age as her.

"What do you want from me? I don't even know who you are!" She screams at the dark figure. Her voice is hoarse, and she's suddenly aware of how dry her mouth is. She starts to wonder just how long has she been out?

"Oh, but you will. We'll get to know each other real well…" And with another devious cackle he disappears into the darkness, leaving her alone once again.

"Damn you!" She yells, staring into the emptiness. She knew it fell on deaf ears and that it wouldn't change anything, but she began screaming, kicking, and punching anything hard. She threw herself at the door in frustration, then slid down to the floor exhausted and empty. Still bewildered by her confinement, she started crying and doubting that she would ever make it out of here alive.

"No Tori, think! I can't let him ruin me just yet…" She thought, slowly getting up and pacing the floor. She began pulling her tight, brown curls in frustration as her clouded mind couldn't come up with any solutions. After what seemed like hours, she finally gave up and sadly collapsed to the ground. She was exhausted from her fit of rage and as she cursed herself for letting her temper get the best of her again, she drifted off to sleep and into oblivion.

But her dreams were never simply oblivion, they were madness and war. She dreamt of death and plague in the towns and the unforgiving Stormcloak soldiers that took her parents away from her. This particular dream had haunted her for many nights since that cold December night when she was a little girl, but tonight was different. Tonight she dreamt of redemption, a man dressed in white saving her not only from the flames of war, but from herself and her old life. She wasn't Tori anymore, she was an angel, she was divine.

She woke up to the sound of the door slowly creaking open. Alarmed, she quickly moved to the other corner of the room.

"Dont be afraid my dear, it's only me" He smirked as he slowly entered the room and started making his way toward her. She flinched with each step he took, and brought her arms up to protect herself.

" Please don't do that, you know I'd never hurt you"

" No, I don't know that! I don't even know who you are!" She said, trying to maintain a brave face despite her rapidly beating heart.

" Ok, fair enough. My name is Darren and my favorite activities include dark magic and collecting spells... oh! and my favorite ice cream is chocolate soft serve" He laughs, and for a second he almost sounds like an average kid. Now that she's thinking properly, she realizes that his voice sounds familiar somehow, almost as if she's heard it a long time ago.

" Dark magic? I see, so you're one of those creepy necromancers that live in the caves. Is that what you plan on doing with me,killing me and using my body?" More terrified by the thought, she tries squeezing herself further into the corner without any luck.

" What?! No! Just because I kidnapped you doesn't mean I would do something like that! I'm using you for my secret project, one that requires only the highest level of dark mage".

" Ok, so why do you need me? I don't even know dark magic…" She says, starting to loosen her grip slowly, unsure if he's telling her the truth or not.

" While you can't help me with more of the important parts of the project, you can do me some small...favors that will allow me to get my work done faster" He stepped closer trying to get a better look at her face. Her bright green eyes are what always perplexed him the most. They showed spirit, fire, and a little bit of something that he couldn't quite understand. That's why it had to be her, it needed to be her.

" So you kidnapped me so that I can be your errand girl?!" She asked, snapping him back into reality.

"Whatever you want to call yourself sweetheart"

" And what if I don't want to help you, what if I refuse?" She gets up as she tries to intimidate him with her glare.

" You can try, but I want to remind you of just how powerful I am" He turns and casts a spell towards a chair at the other end of the room. The chair is immediately engulfed in flames before turning to ashes.

"That could be you" He grins and starts walking towards the door. " Tomorrow bright and early I'll be needing your assistance. Sleep tight!" With that he slams the door, leaving Tori in the dark once more.

" Shit, this is going to be a lot harder than I thought" Tori pouted, trying and failing to fall back asleep as she mentally prepared herself for the morning to come.


	2. Chapter 2

Morning came slowly for Tori as she sat staring at the empty space. How was she supposed to sleep when there was so much happening, so many things that she couldn't control…

"Good morning Tori!" Darren exclaimed. 'Oh great, he's a morning person' Tori thought as she inwardly rolled her eyes. After a long. awkward pause Darren continued. "Well I hope you're also in high spirits today because we have a lot to do. Are you ready?"

Tori continued to stay silent despite his attempts at friendly conversation. Sometime last night while she was staring into darkness, and wondering why it had to be her of all people to be kidnapped, she decided that she didn't owe him anything and he couldn't force her to make conversation with him. That was until he said " You can't just ignore me. If I have to, I'll come up with ways to force you to talk" He raised a hand at her that was glowing with a deep purple mass.

"So what did you have in mind?" She said anxiously, immediately rising and walking towards Darren.

"That's better! For right now, I'll start you off with small things, like organizing my research papers or alphabetizing my spell books, but as I begin to trust you you'll get jobs that I think you'll enjoy. When you've really impressed me, you'll be able to do things that require leaving the castle"

'Leaving the castle…' Tori thought ' I never even thought to ask where I was'. Dragonsreach, a tower on the highest hill, loomed just north of White Run. It was abandoned after the Stormcloaks took over the Empire, making the Imperials no longer in charge of Skyrim, including the jarl that used to reside here. On the outside, Dragonsreach looks ominous and haunted, but on the inside the finery from the Jarl Bulgruf still remains. Darren had no use for those however, the only thing he needed in this castle was the enchantment table. This wasn't just any old enchantment table, it was the most powerful enchantment table in the Empire. Named Forguarf after the creator of the table, it was designed for the most elite dark mages and was the only enchantment table that could make an elixir that could cure any disease. The only way the secret project could work is if he had this table, and if he was the highest level of dark mage. However, Darren was still working on the latter, which is why he needed Tori to help him with the small errands so that he can focus all his energy into being the best.

As Darren was explaining all of this to Tori, she started tuning him out. What did she care what his evil agenda was? The only part she was focusing on was finding a way out. She decided that her best course of action was to wait until he trusted her, and then once he let her do one of his errands outside of the castle she can leave and return home.

But where was home really? After her parents died, she had no other family to take her in and she was forced into the Honorall Orphanage in Riften. When she was thirteen, they let her go out to get some supplies for the younger kids. That was the day she found Brynjolf in the market looking for new recruits for the Thieves Guild, and she immediately took the opportunity, never looking back.

Darren noticed the vacant stare in Tori's eyes and snapped his fingers in her face. "Hello, are you even listening to me? Your first assignment is to put all of these papers in order and then put them in this binding to make a book out of them" He shows her a room with papers stacked five feet high. Tori sighs as she looks at the papers, realizing that escaping wouldn't be as easy as she thought.


End file.
